Hellish; a suitable word to describe the coach journey into Thailand, the worst to date. It was 22 hours on a normal sitting bus, on unmade roads, made worse by the unfortunate Singaporean girl who refused to stop being sick...on the seat opposite me. After the fifth or sixth time, the driver refused to mop it up. The smell was unbearable. To make matters worse, it just kept on coming. God knows what she had eaten. Well actually, I could give you a pretty good description of what she had eaten but the quantities were unbelievable. Unsurprisingly, I didn't get much sleep during the night and having arrived in Chiang Mai later than expected, I was ready for bed. It was raining when we reached the bus station and the city centre was a tuk tuk ride away. I split the fare with a few others from the same bus who were equally as tired and we were all keen to find the first, decent hostel we came across. In the pouring we rain, we eventually came across the Hug Hostel which is in a good location, on the edge of the old city. Unfortunately they didn't give hugs at check in, which is what we all could probably have done with, but the beds were good substitutes and I didn't see the others until the following morning.

I woke early to bright sunshine and a high heat, it made a nice change from the rain and so I went for an explore around the town. There are plenty of Buddhist temples dotted around within the the ruined city walls which are really nice to see but after a while, it was a job to tell them apart. In the afternoon, I had planned, with a few others from the hostel, to hire scooters and head into the hills to visit yet another temple. Just as were planning our route, we'd heard rumours of the Thai police pulling foreigners over and checking for licenses. Obviously very few of us have licences and would consequently be handed a big fine. We came to the conclusion our budgets could do without the potential fines and so it was back in a tuk tuk. It was a great shame because the roads were fantastic leading up into the mountains. It was around 350 steps to the Golden Stupa and although it was a scorching day, the views that we met at the top made the climb worth it.

In the evenings, we would visit the night market which has a great atmosphere. There are bars, pop-up restaurants and live music making it a great place to start the evening. Depending on how many beers have been drunk, following on from the night market is the Ladyboy Cabaret. A sceptical that's so bad, it's actually very good and apparently a sell out most nights. We had guest appearances from Rhianna and Christina Aguilera, who had us all in stitches and who actually looked scarily alike their respective acts... dodgy photos to follow.

I was in two minds whether to go and see some elephants here, which seems to be the most popular attraction. I had read before I got here about the ones that can be ridden are mistreated and overworked which half put me off. However since I arriving, I'd heard so many good things about certain places and in the end, I couldn't resist. The place that I had booked to go and visit was a sanctuary and riding the elephants wasn't permitted. Instead, I got spend most of the day looking after seven elephants ranging from the forty year old grandmother to the four year old granddaughter. Most of the day was spent feeding them but we also got to mud bathe them and then wash them off in the waterfall.
It was hard to leave the elephants having spent such a good day with them. The sanctuary were so accommodating and it was obvious that the elephants were their priority. It was a day that I had never anticipated but is up there as one of the best days I've had in Asia.

Tonight I'm leaving Chiang Mai for Koh Samui, two short flights and a wait in between. Although I'm starting to sense the end of my trip, I know there's still a lot to look forward to and I can't wait to get to the islands and start diving. I'm due to land around 10pm which means I will have to spend a night on Koh Samui but tomorrow morning I plan to catch the first ferry across to Koh Tao- a supposed Mecca for divers.